Consolidating, migrating, updating, or otherwise modifying a cloud-computing environment, enterprise network, or other networked entity may require assigning new network addresses to each resource affected by the modification. These assignments maybe performed manually by a network administrator or engineer, or may be performed automatically by a network-management tool.
It may not be possible, however, to change certain network addresses during such a modification. A hardcoded address may, for example, be explicitly specified in the source code of a software application or may be physically embedded into a physical or virtual device's hardware or firmware. If such a static, hardcoded, address is not identified during a network modification, the persons or tools that manage the modification may attempt to alter a static address of a network device or software module, requiring manual correction in order to rectify any resulting failures or errors.
There is currently no straightforward way to automatically identify hardcoded addresses before they begin to generate errors caused by an unsuccessful attempt to alter them.